In The Future We Need, Erica Smiley and Sarita Gupta bring a novel perspective to building worker power and what labor organizing could look like in the future, suggesting ways to evolve collective bargaining to match the needs of modern people—not only changing their wages and working conditions, but being able to govern over more aspects of their lives.

Weaving together stories of real working people, Smiley and Gupta position the struggle to build collective bargaining power as a central element in the effort to build a healthy democracy and explore both existing levers of power and new ones we must build for workers to have the ability to negotiate in today and tomorrow's contexts. The Future We Need illustrates the necessity of centralizing the fight against white supremacy and gender discrimination, while offering paths forward to harness the power of collective bargaining in every area for a new era.

Erica Smiley is the executive director of Jobs With Justice.

Sarita Gupta is director of the Ford Foundation's Future of Work(ers) program.

[Smiley and Gupta] challenge the real powers in the economy on issues that affect not only the workplace but also family and community life.

Erica Smiley and Sarita Gupta's new book The Future We Need makes a significant and original contribution. What is exciting [about the book] is not so much its familiar litany of organized labor's difficulties as the creativity of the solutions it proposes. Smiley and Gupta's analysis and prescription point the way forward.

The Future We Need reveals for scholars and lay people alike the many ways that we are part of a lineage of working people who dreamed of and fought for a democracy that has real meaning in our daily lives. The authors provide a blueprint for a future in which ordinary people practice democracy every day in all aspects of their lives, a vision that surpasses simply voting but encourages collective governance. I assert that The Future We Need will be the go-to text for labor educators, organizers, and scholars alike.

[The Future We Need] functions as an accessible device for individuals working within unjust labor complexes, and in examining the failings of the past, looks forward.

This book shows how to begin to think of conditions in society not simply as issues, but as systemically connected parts of a whole.... pick up Smiley and Gupta's book to spark new ideas and perspectives on what is possible—and needed—now for the working class.

In The Future We Need: Organizing for a Better Democracy in the 21st Century, Erica Smiley and Sarita Gupta deliver a transformative vision for the future of workers, along with innovative strategies to build an economy that works for everyone. This is essential reading for everyone turning toward state and local work after bouncing off the neoliberal ceiling of the Biden Administration and a divided Congress, and now reeling from the hard right majority Supreme Court and their spate of backward rulings.

Thomas Anton Kochan, George Maverick Bunker Professor of Management at MIT:

A really thoughtful and creative mix of labor history, analysis of current policies and institutions, and wonderful personal stories—including their own. I can't recall ever seeing a book like this in our field. The Future We Need is a powerful statement about what we need to do, and can do, to shape a better future for all.

Fatima Goss Graves, President, National Women's Law Center:

Finally, a book that centers the struggle against race and gender discrimination in the effort to build power for all workers, not simply as an act of solidarity but as a necessity to achieve economic democracy. The Future We Need is the book we all need right now.

Nancy MacLean, author of Democracy in Chains:

How does the worsening state of American workers relate to the escalating assault on democracy? Read this vital book to find out. Filled with first-hand stories shared with two veteran and visionary organizers, The Future We Need offers an illuminating and urgent explanation. A must-read for anyone who wants to know how to build the power to achieve a fair economy and a dignified future for all.

Dave Zirin, The Nation, author of The Kaepernick Effect:

Unions are vital for a functioning democracy. They are also critical for correcting the historic inequality currently ripping this country apart. The Future We Need gives us a roadmap out of this morass. I hope we have the courage to read it and follow its prescription for a more just world.

Ai-jen Poo, Founder and Executive Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance and author of The Age of Dignity:

A refreshing call-to-action, The Future We Need helps us understand both the challenges facing workers today and what must happen to change our economy for the better, with clarity and insight. The narratives and case studies in this book offer strategies that go beyond outdated, more traditional frameworks that left key groups of workers, like domestic workers, behind. A blueprint for the way forward, it's a must read!

Saru Jayaraman, author of One Fair Wage:

Anchored in the fundamental fissures that plagued the American democracy experiment from day one, The Future We Need outlines straightforward approaches today's workers are testing to build power and shared governance in ways that will get us back on the path towards building a true multiracial democracy.

Sally Kohn, Activist and author of The Opposite Of Hate:

When we look back on how we were finally able to build a multiracial democracy—politically and economically—one clear seed will be this book. It points the way to our better future and how to get there.

Janice R. Fine, Rutgers University, author of Worker Centers:

This is a powerful, well-conceived, well written and organized contribution to several fields including union renewal, collective bargaining, social movements, racial justice and women's studies. It will have appeal well beyond the academy to the broad audience of those interested in social justice.